


First Halloween

by nogohello



Series: Of leaving, returning and staying [3]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Adult Number Five | The Boy, Aged-Up Number Five | The Boy, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Father-Daughter Relationship, Fluff, Gen, Halloween, Halloween Costumes, Lila Pitts-centric, Number Five | The Boy-centric, One Shot, Parent Number Five | The Boy, Parent-Child Relationship, Young Lila Pitts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:07:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,027
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27307477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nogohello/pseuds/nogohello
Summary: “How about this then: You plan out the costumes—and I warn you: you better choose something acceptable—and tomorrow we spend exactly two hours, to the minute, outside. You get the candy, I trail after and that’s it.”With a squeal of glee, Lila wraps her arms around his torso.Damn his soft spot for the girl, because it looks like Five will have to celebrate Halloween tomorrow._________________This takes place in a universe where instead of The Handler, Five adopted Lila. Here's them celebrating Halloween :)Part of a series.
Relationships: Number Five | The Boy & Lila Pitts
Series: Of leaving, returning and staying [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1976401
Comments: 5
Kudos: 69





	First Halloween

„ _But Fiiiive_ , I’ve never gone trick-or-treating before! And all the other kids do it!”

Five slaps the novel he’s reading closed with a look of impatience. They’ve been having this conversation for the past ten minutes, and the end of it still doesn’t seem near.

“What do I care if the other kids do it? You have no reason to walk from house to house begging for goods like you’ve grown up on the streets. If you want candy, we can just get some, Lila.”

“It’s not the same if it’s not _earned_. And you wear a costume and go with friends and, and- it’s about the _feeling_ of it, Five. _The_ _atmosphere_.”

Lila does a grand gesture of pouting combined with huge, sad puppy eyes as she steps closer to Five’s desk. He is already annoyed enough with his work space being invaded, and now _this_ nonsense.

The thing is… Five has never celebrated Halloween either.

He grew up with six other children, isolated in a massive mansion, and not once were they allowed to dress up and walk around the neighborhood.

Klaus was the first to find out about the festivity, he remembers, and they were all obsessed with the idea of it for a couple of years—all except for Five, who has never been a friend of unnecessary traditions and fancy spectacles with shallow pay-off.

But here Lila is, resembling his siblings as she’s dying to get to ‘ _be spooked_ ’, as she calls it. And whatever the ten-year-old directs her determinations after, she will achieve.

“What would you even go as?”, Five asks, “And where and when? It gets dark so quickly now, I don’t wanna drop you off and never see you again; although that notion does sound tempting, now that I think about it.”

The girl rolls her eyes, as if trying to take a look at her choppy bangs.

“I still have today left to decide; I can just make a costume myself. Maybe something from a movie or whatever, I really don’t care as long as I get to go…”

She strolls around the room, pointedly avoiding Five’s line of sight.

“ _Aaand_ you won’t have to worry about me getting kidnapped, old man! You’ll accompany me, after all!”

Five turns and throws her the most unimpressed and unamused glare he can manage, but Lila, he has gathered over the years, is one of the few people on earth who are immune to the death-stare of his.

“I thought you wanted to go with friends, what do you need _me_ for?”

“You should feel honoured I dare take you with me!” The girl stops and gasps. “Maybe we can have matching outfits or something!”

“ _Lila_!”

“ _Pleeease_!”

Five can already foresee the headache he’ll have to deal with if he doesn’t get this over with soon. Releasing an exhausted sigh, he looks at the clock. He should get to making dinner soon.

As he gets up from his chair, he pinches the bridge of his nose.

“How about this then: You plan out the costumes—and I warn you: you better choose something acceptable—and tomorrow we spend exactly two hours, to the minute, outside. You get the candy, I trail after and that’s it.”

With a squeal of glee, Lila wraps her arms around his torso.

_Damn his soft spot for the girl, because it looks like Five will have to celebrate Halloween tomorrow._

* * *

Lila is over the moon. Happy as a clam.

She’s finally managed to convince her father to go trick-or-treating with her.

And she even has the greatest idea for a costume.

Pulling out her favourite DVD from the stack by their TV, Lila grins. She can already tell it’s perfect.

“You okay with some Bánh Xèo for tonight’s meal or is it not gruesome enough for the occasion? Is there such a thing as Halloween’s Eve?”, Five teases as he heads to the kitchen.

Lila carefully hides the DVD under her big sweater and narrows her eyes at him. “Nah, sounds good, if you don't mess it up like last time. But tomorrow we’ll feast on the souls of the tortured ones.”

The man has already disappeared from the room, but Lila can hear the smirk in his tone. “Sure, we’ll have a picknick out at the graveyard.”

On her tip-toes the girl goes to her room, starting with her first preparations for tomorrow.

She just needs some black clothing and some dark kind of eyeshadow; maybe also some hair-gel.

May the costume works begin.

* * *

Five eyes Lila as soon as she enters the small dining room. Her mouth visibly waters as soon as she smells the food and so she digs in quite quickly, ignoring his gaze.

“You’ve got a costume idea?”, he inquires, sipping some iced tea.

She nods eagerly, mouth too full to talk. After gulping down her food, she adds: “But it’s a surprise for now.”

Five raises his eyebrow. “Sure.”

The meal stays as a quieter affair.

Five reminds her that the principal office called him again to ‘ _discuss his daughter’s stand-offish attitude_ ’ and Lila just shoots him a look of ‘ _Whatever_.’

He really does not find it in himself to care, either—as he knows it’s not about her smarts or her ability to show manners and thoughtfulness. Imagining what it’d be like for him to go to public school, he deems he’d lash out much worse, and all the teachers he’s gotten to know so far (which pretty much concludes all of them) seem pretty unlikeable to him anyway.

He does worry from time to time though; the longer they’ve been staying in this town, the more judging the citizens seem to grow.

When Lila was quite small, making friends was as easy for her as making a sassy comment or telling a made-up story, but now the others seem to have grown colder towards her. Five supposes this might also be the reason why she will not be celebrating Halloween with people her age, but him instead.

He wonders if he’d have been similar, had he grown up a different way. Would he have… fit in somewhere?

As he was still part of the Academy, he always thought the reason he felt so little resemblance between himself and anyone, was because seven children was just not enough—you’d need a bigger group to stumble across a mind that thinks alike.

Sure, there were little connections to them all. Vanya would always be the most perceptive to his emotions and ideas.

Ben would be the one who’d easily be able to relate to his thought-process, if properly explained, and he’d be able to help him figure out calculations and specific concepts.

Diego would always be the most willing to deal with Five on his bad days, when his body would tremble from training and he’d try to shut everyone else out by sneering and being insulting.

Klaus was the best at talking to him when overwhelmed and caught in his own head, spaced out and tired.

Allison was good at supporting him as a voice of reason, but still being fun and easy to be around.

And Luther; he’d share Five’s interests in sciences, though his was always mostly rooted in space.

But now he looks at Lila, this little girl, and he sees himself in her and wishes she weren’t so akin to him sometimes, so she’d struggle less. She is a lot louder than him, more extraverted and energetic; but the way they… function is the same.

Watching her finish her plate, Five is as ever so often reminded of the lengths he’d go to keep her safe and have her be happy.

And if that includes celebrating Halloween, then so be it.

* * *

The next day, Lila is practically jumping and skipping through the house.

She hasn’t been this excited in a long time— _her first real Halloween!_ And she’s pretty much done with the outfits for the evening!

The costume for Five has pretty much been perfected; she’d stolen the materials from his closet and their attic. So now, that the final hours are approaching, she just needs to do a grand reveal.

Yes, Lila is ecstatic. And she dearly hopes Five will have fun to—he should let loose in a while, after all. They’ll be the most splendid father-daughter duo to grace this stupid town.

Knocking on Five’s door she leans forward to speak right against the wood. “Are you ready for the grand reveal?”

Her voice booms across the hallway, a cheap imitation of one of those boxing announcers she’s seen on the TV. Slapping her legs, she does a short drumroll as Five opens the door, unexcited as always.

“So, _mademoiselle_ , what will we go as?”, he asks, voice over-exaggeratedly monotone.

“ _Tada_!”, Lila calls out, pulling out the DVD that she’d hid under her sweater once more.

“The Addams Family?” Five raises an eyebrow.

“I’ll be Wednesday and you’ll be Gomez! It’s the perfect father-daughter costume, don’t you think?”

Five’s features soften as he smiles at her. “Will you help me transform then?”

Lila winks at him and grins through her whole face. “Follow me!”

* * *

The girl has done an extra-ordinary job at preparing their costumes, Five finds. She’s gathered things from all over the house to perfect their appearances.

Her dark hair is a bit too short, but they still manage to give her a decent pair of braids, as she finishes the outfit in all black: a long dress with a white collar and shoes of patent leather with equally dark tights.

Five gets to wear one of his suits, with a neat purple tie, and after Lila powders both of their faces to make them appear paler, she draws a fake moustache on him. Watching himself in the mirror Five has to laugh (and for a while he ponders if he should one day grow a real one).

He slicks his hair back to add a last, finishing touch.

So they are ready, it seems.

Gomez and Wednesday Addams. Five and Lila. _Father and daughter._

* * *

Lila can feel the other kids staring as Five and her wander through the neighborhood. She tries her best to ignore it, shooting a mean look towards them once in a while.

They go through the haunted house first (a tiny attraction built within the Library, for the children to pass through.)

Five, of course, doesn’t flinch—he barely even twitches with his eyes or gasps in surprise—as the actors inside howl and lunge at them. Meanwhile Lila has to be held back and restrained by her companion, since she is always ready to beat up anyone who crosses her path (she wants to pretend it’s a sign of her being tough, but maybe she does get scared easily.)

Only once does someone catch Five off-guard and Lila notices that he is the jumpy kind of person. He does not scream, he does not pale; he just pulls his whole body backwards as if to escape.

It is a weird motion, she finds. It looks funny.

They only visit six houses on their trick-or-treating trip, but Lila is not bothered by that.

Everyone greets them with an almost pitiful, fake brightness of “Oh dear, it’s the Pitts! How lovely to see you two!” and Lila just extends her bag towards them with a devilish grin and the words “ _Candy_ , please!”

She knows people give them funny looks, she knows there are rumors about them—especially now that she’s been getting in trouble quite a lot at school.

But it cannot stop her from enjoying the evening, and no matter what others might think, she’d not exchange parents with anyone.

The night ends on a sugar-rush and a marathon of horror movies Five had sneakily bought without her knowledge. They laugh and complain about the stupidity of characters in films and towards two in the morning they’re both asleep on the couch, in the midst of blankets, sweets and popcorn.

Lila can still feel the smile on her face when she wakes up the next morning to the smell of waffles and French toast.


End file.
